Talking to Teens About Mental Health with Jamie Edelbrock

In this episode, Dr. Cam is joined by Jamie Edelbrock, author of Tangled Up. Tangled up (@TangledUpBook on Facebook and Instagram) is a children's book that can be used as a starting point on your child's mental health journey (and your own!). In this beautiful story, she weaves in the message that we all feel tangled up at times and that's okay. It's also okay to get help. 

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EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Dr. Cam: Hey, I'm Dr. Cam. And I'm super excited because, other than my daughter, I have my first guest on my show. Jamie Edelbrock is here. She’s married to her high school sweetheart. They have three daughters, and she's worn many hats. You have been a homeschool mom. Right there. I'm blown away because I don't know how you do that. A preschool director, a family ministry director, and you rocked it. And now you are an author? Yes. That's crazy. It was almost a year ago today. We were sitting on your front porch, drinking tea. And your whole world had just blown up!  So, take us there. And then, a year later, you are an actual author with a publisher going into bookstores worldwide.

Jamie Edelbrock: Like what I know it's crazy. And I say Oh, it's only God. Because a year ago, we were drinking tea and crying on my front porch.

DC: That's true. We were doing that.

JE: In such a short amount of time. I had lost a church family, a job, my husband was deployed. I had nothing, literally nothing. That's what I felt like my whole world was flipped upside down.  I knew everything was happening for a reason. But I had nothing. And at that same time, my kids were struggling, they can tell you know, the world had been our little world had been flipped upside down. And here we were, Mom and three daughters because you know, Eric was away, trying to figure it all out. And it was painful to watch my kids struggle. But also me. I use the word tangled up because that's one way I can describe it is your mind is a mess. Your hearts a mess. Like it's all just jumbled up, untangle this and knots. And I was literally sitting in a gymnastics class with one of my daughters and knowing that another one was struggling really, really, really bad. With school, with dad being away, with friendships, all of that. And I wanted to tell her like it's going to be okay, you need to see a counselor, a therapist. She didn't want to go. So, I poured my heart out in a letter to her in gymnastics class. I was just writing, writing, writing, writing, writing. And when it was finished, I could literally vision pictures. And I thought this has to be a book. I took it to a couple of friends. I went to one of my dear friend’s house and said, “Hey, listen to this.” And swallowed some pride and thought, “Well, I'm probably going to fail. But I'm just going to push this out to publishers.” And sure enough, a couple of them grabbed it. And I went with Mascot books (https://mascotbooks.com/). And the rest is history. It's only God. Now a year later with illustrator, publisher, marketing director, all of that. Here we are.

Dr. Cam: It is absolutely amazing. And I remember talking about it and you sent me the manuscript and reading it and going, “Oh my God, this is absolutely beautiful.” The whole way you described tangled up in this description is so incredible. But who knew a year later? Tell us a little bit about what the book is about and the purpose of the book because I think that's a big piece of it.

JE: Yeah, so it's a children's book. It talks about how kids get tangled up. Obviously, adults get tangled up too. But this is directed at kids to let them know, hey, things get you tangled up, whether it's big things or little things, whether it's daddy being deployed, moving, bullies, struggling with school, a death in the family, someone's sick, well, heaven sakes, COVID now. All of this, anything to get us tangled up. In the book, I describe how we are made from these beautiful threads. And we're made to do beautiful things, bright, sparkly threads of us. And when things happen in our life with big things, little things, we get tangled up in knots. And sometimes moms and dads, sisters, brothers can't help. Sometimes friends can’t even help. And that's where counselors and therapists come in.  In the book, I call them professional detanglers because that's what they are. Love that. In the book, they take the beautiful threads of us that have been tangled up, and they can detangle them, they know how to make us flowing and brilliant and bright again. And one little idea that you had Cam when I brought this to you because I trust you and I love your wisdom and you are one of those amazing professional detanglers.

DC: I'm going to take that title by the way. Teen Detangler

JE: You had the idea of putting in animals. And so, throughout the book, there are these kittens that get tangled up in yarn, and one's trying to help. And by the end of the book, they're not tangled up anymore. But I love that idea that you put in there, that was so great.

DC: I love that. I just want to say as an adult, that book is helpful. And right now, so many people are feeling tangled up. The kids are feeling it. Teens are feeling it. Adults are feeling it. And I feel like this book, it's written for kids, but it has a message that is really, really important for all of us. And it is said in a way that is so beautiful. You’re touching on a topic that is so difficult, and it's difficult for us as parents to bring up to our kids. Because I think there's a stigma to seeking help. It means you're broken. Seeking help means something's wrong with you. And that's not the case in this book. So clearly it shows that it has nothing to do with you being broken. You just need to be detangled.

JE: We all get there. We are all in some way have been, or will be, or are tangled up. And it is hard to make that first call. It's hard. Like that's a big deal. When you make the call, like, hey, my family needs help, or I need help, you're admitting something is wrong. People need to know there's something wrong with everybody. To make that first call is so important. But I've had adult friends that have said, “I've read this book, and this has helped me to realize it's okay to reach out for help.” I mean, the saying is it takes a village .100%. I do not know where I would be without our counselors or therapists. I mean, in their school and church and outside of that as well. And if there's any message, it’s to reach out for help, become untangled. We are made for beautiful things, amazing things. And it's so hard to do that when we're stuck. And when we're tangled up. It's so hard.

DC: I love that. It just occurred to me too, when your necklaces and stuff get tangled up, you can sit there and try to work it out and it gets more and more and more tangled. The easiest way to fix it is to be really loose with it and just let it fall out. It's like you just have to breathe, give yourself space. Instead of constantly trying to fix, fix, fix, and getting somebody to help you do that. It's all about just breathing and taking some time, just letting those fallout. So, tell us now because I love your current story. Do you mind telling us a little bit about your move to Indonesia?

JE: It’s so funny that this book is coming out. I'm feeling a little bit tangled up right now. Stuck just because we are moving to Indonesia, which we're so excited about. But we were supposed to move on October 1, and things just keep getting delayed. So, we are literally sitting in this half-empty house, already said goodbyes, kind of stuck in the middle. We have a house, job interviews lined up. We had all these things at the girls’ school, and now we are waiting and sitting here stuck. And it's literally out of our control. We have to trust God with it. But yeah, we are feeling stuck. And the only thing I can do is one, we're together as a family, which is amazing. But when I do feel stuck is to talk about it. Like it's living examples. You practice what you preach. Here you are. How are we going to handle this? We’re excited to get there. And I know that it's all in perfect timing and God's timing when we end up there, which is supposed to be in the next couple of weeks. So yeah, fingers crossed, and I'm going to get there.

DC: I love how you've also taken the steps that you can. I think a lot of people can relate just to COVID. Because I think most of us do feel like we're just stuck right in our houses and not able to go anywhere, yours is even more literal. So, you could just stay there and literally just sit in the middle of an empty room and cry and say this sucks. And yet, you're telling me all these things that you're doing. The mindset that you've had is looking for the pros to this. Your kids are now taking school there. So, they're adjusting to the new hours, they're meeting friends already. By the time they get there, they've already taken a big step and they don't have all the steps to take at once. Right? The book is coming out and you may be here when your book comes out, right. I just love how even now a lot of people would sit there and there are so many things for you to literally bitch about. You’re finding the good in it. Which is why a year ago, you're sitting on your porch crying. You were still dreaming, but you didn't know what you were going to do. You just knew you were going to do something, right. I remember you taking walks and taking pictures and I was always so inspired by that. Because it's finding the beauty in the midst of all of this chaos, right? And by doing that you untangled yourself and you found your path and I think it's so inspirational and I want people listening to this to just take that and say yeah, this can suck but there is beauty in it.

JE: There's an outlet that I can take out of this what time says that's it's hour by hour, day by day, sometimes minute by minute, but this whole process has made me see that every day is a gift and every time with your people is a gift. And even in this waiting being able to spend time with the people, I love here and just I mean even little family traditions like going to Cox farms and I getting to be here for my goddaughters birthday. All of those little things are huge and it's just day by day, step by step like there is beauty in every moment if you look for it, it's there it is there.

DC: Jamie you've always been someone that I've looked up to because of the way that you're able to just view the world and I just want to thank you for that because you keep me focused and thinking, “okay there's something good in this.” How can people find your book when it comes out and follow you because you're going to be doing a tour at some point and people can say, “I saw you on Dr. Cam’s show.”

JE: I'm on Facebook and Instagram right now. It’s @TangledUpBook. The presale starts in November, all the links will be there. It's going to be sold almost everywhere books are sold. Follow me @TangledUpBook on Facebook and Instagram, all the information all the details will be there.

DC: And I'll link to it from YouTube and on the podcast. Jamie, thank you. This was my first official interview and I love it. We’ve got to meet back a year from now—if we have time in our schedules, because we're gonna be so busy with all of our success (laughs). So, let's plan on meeting back in a year and checking in. As we know, a lot can happen in a year.

JE: Absolutely. Absolutely. I love it.

DC: So, if you guys liked this story, which there's no way you can’t. I mean, come on, Jamie is so inspirational. Please share it, like it, send Jamie some love. And get the book when it comes out because it's beautiful and amazing.